Notes / Commercial Description:
As craft beer pioneers, we embarked on an expedition to brew the benchmark West Coast IPA. We ventured into the unknown and struck gold, discovering a tantalizing menagerie of hops. Simcoe for tropical and grapefruit zest, Columbus for hop pungency, Centennial for pine notes, Citra for citrus zest and Cascade for floral aroma are layered throughout the brewing process. West Coast IPA® exemplifies the Green Flash spirit of adventure and discovery.

T: Hop flavors hit immediately with a full frontal attack. The profile is big pine resin on the palate with herbal and spicy notes. Citric flavors well up from underneath on the midpalate and culminate in an orange and grapefruit juice-like aftertaste. Great bitterness all the way across the palate, lingering with a slightly astringent tingle throughout the long finish. Good malt backbone on this one, with a nice underlying sweetness buried under big ass hops.

M: Nice medium-bodied brew with good carbonation. Decent slickness.

D: Very good. This is a great IPA and easy to drink more than one.

Overall, a superb effort by Green Flash. Quintessential west coast IPA - very appropriately named. Everything clicks with this brew. Very impressed.

Appearance  This poured a big and thick orange in color with a beautiful orangish-white head that came up just right, showed great retention, and left some awesome lacing on the inside of my pint glass. This was the kind of beer that makes you want to fetch your camera.

Smell  The West Coast hops and sweetish malts are balanced just right at the nose. The sharp tangerine rind smell and the lightly-toasted malts work well together. You can just tell that this is going to taste great.

Taste  The flavors work together just as well as the smells did. There's a big rush of pine that I failed to pick up at the nose. The malts have a lot of caramel sweetness to them. This is a sharp, powerful ale.

Mouthfeel  This is a big big IPA. It's shy of full-bodied but bigger than medium. It's not overly dry but has enough dryness to shock the average drinker.

Drinkability  I wasn't expecting this from a sub-$2 beer but this heavy hitter is incredibly well done.

Holy jesus. To say this is slightly bitter would be an understatement. I'm going to grab a paint scraper to remove the hop bitterness from my tongue, thx. Super, almost pilsner level brightness on the pour, almost strange to see a super clear/mega bright beer after being in NE for a while. Some oxydation, on a 2 month old bottle. decent hop flavor, but so overwhelmed by the face raping bitterness that made GF so popular.

The aroma is smoothly fragrant, flowery, fruity, and sweet with lime, grapefruit, and pine as well as a tropical aroma. It has a slightly hazy, orange-ish, deep amber body with a cream-colored frothy, bubbly head. The flavor is bitter and resiny but not too sharp, with considerable softening maltiness. The hops also contribute a flavorful and complex fruitiness—orange, peach, and apricot come to mind. As the bitterness wears off after each swallow, the maltiness lingers. The mouthfeel is slightly dry but smooth. The carbonation is delicate—soft and frothy but not excessive, with just a little carbonic bite and then hop acidity on the way down.

What impresses me about this IPA is that it manages to be bold and yet delicate and well balanced. A variety of flavors shine through despite the usual intense resiny flavor and bitterness. The mouthfeel is also nicely put together, as it provides a good counterbalance to the intense flavors.

I tried this brew years ago before I was a beer advocate. I remember loving it, but in my reviewing days I had to try it again. I love the purple label that stands out and the green rays of flashing sun that forms the logo for this brewery. It has 8.1% ABV and 95 IBUs. Now, I’m a hop head so I relish the challenge to taste the bitterness, because some say that the average beer enthusiast can’t tell the difference between 80 IBUs and 60 IBUs and the human tongue can rarely detect bitterness units in excess of 90 IBUs

Look-It pours a delightful copper tinged amber color that really captures the essence of what a good IPA should look like. The head is thick and beautiful and releases so many aromas that are paramount to enjoying this complex brew. It leaves delicate and beautiful lacing on the glass.

Smell-It smells fruity and hoppy with strong cannabinoid attributes. I can already tell it is a great beer. The smell is citrus rind and pine. I get a lot of dank earthy hops as well. The malts are, thankfully, on the lighter side and very well-balanced.

Taste-It tastes like the epitome of the West Coast Style IPA. I get hops galore, but in the right quantities and with the perfect balance. The alcohol is subtle and well-hidden. It warms the tongue as the sip proceeds. I get piney, earthy, orange rind, and citrus hops mixed with a perfectly muted roasted grain malt-base. After the gulp, I notice tongue-smacking resin, oils, earthy hops, an ashy aftertaste, and plenty of grapefruit and zest. It is so juicy and fruity and bready. The West Coast fruits and flavors and dank hops really come out beautifully.

Mouthfeel-It is full-bodied and delicious. The malts are thankfully not from a syrup extract. I can tell from the slight sweetness and mouth consistency that they use true malted grains and a variety of delicious hops. It finishes clean and smooth with a lingering bitterness that is cannabinoid and oil resins from the several hop varieties.

Overall- It is a tough style to really do well and this beer does it exquisitely. I must say that this is the best West Coast IPA in the Universe or at least in our Galaxy!

Look (4.5): This looks so appealing to me. A dark golden almost amber hue when settled and extremely unfiltered. There's minimal white colored carbonation for the head. And when I say unfiltered, there's chunky bits in there, the yummy looking kind.

Smell (3.75): It's not extremely overpowering, but there's pleasent citrus, floral, earth and piney notes all coming off this. It's very complex it seems, but at the same time with so much hop aromas in there I'm also getting a nice balanced malt sweetness there.

Taste (3.75): Unbalancedly bitter, but that's what they're going for obviously. With that said there's still a large amount of malts in there to help but out the bitterness.

Mouthfeel (3.5): Medium to full bodied, very acidic. Orange peel like acidity that at the same time has a nice sweet subtle softness.

Overall (4): This is one of the classics, so that's why I'll give it the respect it deserves. I like it for what it is, but that doesn't mean I like it.

Ooured a slightly hazy burnt orange with a thinner but sticky white head that leaves spots of lace as it settled.Fresh raw hop aroma comes at ya hard when first opening the bottle extremely piney with big grapefruit notes as well I even noticed a touch of caramel malt as well.Well oddly enough hop dominated hop oils and resin dominate quite piney but that resiny finish is great just enough of a hint of caramel makes it a gem in my mind.A few years ago I would have thought a good beer but a little over the top for me now I take it all in,gotta love the hops.